Hitchens Indicts Obama

[Darth Rotor]

But none of that matters because his pastor's an idiot

The pastor is not up for election.

Neither was Billy Carter. Did Jimmy disown him?

DR

 

[WildCat]

Is there any reason to think he would pick anything other than competent experienced experts? Rezko raised money for Bush and didn't land any cabinet positions from that.

Rezko has cultivated Obama since his days at Harvard. This culminated in them buying property together in which Obama got a sweetheart deal (until he made up for it when the media exposed it). Rezko wasn't involved in such shady deals with Bush, nor did they have as long a history together, nor were they anywhere near as close as he was with Obama. In fact, Rezko was only involved with Bush through Kjellander - another sleazy Illinois political creep who gained access to the White House via his old friend Karl Rove. But that's another thread...

Wright was one of a 170 members of Obama's African American Religious Leadership Committee. Hardly an influential part of the campaign with policy setting power.

You don't think Obama's personal pastor had more influence in that group than the others did? And I don't know about you, but I'm not real keen on a POTUS candidate having a "Religious Leadership Committee", particularly one based on race.

So, before these two controversies were brought to light, were you were open to voting to Obama? Was it only this that closed him off as an option for you?

I'm on record here as being a Obama suporter, this is giving me second thoughts. The hypocracy of talking about bridging racial divides on one hand, while coddling up to racially divisive black preachers on the other doesn't sit real well with me.

 

[WildCat]

Either way my point remains the same: Obama made the right choice on the biggest foreign policy decision of the past few decades.

There was nothing riding on his choice, no political consequences to his decision if he was wrong. How Obama reacts when the heat is on (and his political career is noticeably absent of votes on politically difficult choices) remains to be seen.

 

[CHF]

There was nothing riding on his choice, no political consequences to his decision if he was wrong. How Obama reacts when the heat is on (and his political career is noticeably absent of votes on politically difficult choices) remains to be seen.

Agreed. The man is largely untested and unexperienced in foreign affairs.

That said, I'd rather take my chances with a guy who has not yet proven himself over two people who had the heat on and made the wrong call.

 

[BPSCG]

The pastor is not up for election.

Neither was Billy Carter. Did Jimmy disown him?

DR

You don't choose your brother. You do choose your pastor. You also choose to stay in his church for twenty years, long after you've become aware that he's a vicious racist. You also choose to have him preside over your wedding vows. You also choose to have him baptize your children. You also choose to give his church over $20,000.

Is this the only Christian church, the only pastor that Obama was able to find in Chicago? I bet it wasn't. Was there no other church in Chicago that wouldn't preach Wright's kind of filth? I bet there wasn't. Was there any compelling reason this guy who sells himself as the "post-racial" candidate had to belong to a black church?

My take: Obama joined this church because with five thousand members, it was a good place to mine votes. He disregarded or ignored the hate speech coming from the pulpit because who believes that anyway? The voters are in that church and if I have to buddy up with the whackjob on the pulpit to get those 5,000 people to vote for me for alderman, that's a small price to pay. In politics, you do what you have to do to get elected.

You don't choose your brother. You do choose your pastor. Someone whose scales balanced more towards his own personal integrity and less toward his political ambitions would have chosen to walk out after the first racist diatribe. And maybe lost the alderman election.

 

[TriskettheKid]

You don't choose your brother. You do choose your pastor. You also choose to stay in his church for twenty years, long after you've become aware that he's a vicious racist. You also choose to have him preside over your wedding vows. You also choose to have him baptize your children. You also choose to give his church over $20,000.

Is this the only Christian church, the only pastor that Obama was able to find in Chicago? I bet it wasn't. Was there no other church in Chicago that wouldn't preach Wright's kind of filth? I bet there wasn't. Was there any compelling reason this guy who sells himself as the "post-racial" candidate had to belong to a black church?

My take: Obama joined this church because with five thousand members, it was a good place to mine votes. He disregarded or ignored the hate speech coming from the pulpit because who believes that anyway? The voters are in that church and if I have to buddy up with the whackjob on the pulpit to get those 5,000 people to vote for me for alderman, that's a small price to pay. In politics, you do what you have to do to get elected.

You don't choose your brother. You do choose your pastor. Someone whose scales balanced more towards his own personal integrity and less toward his political ambitions would have chosen to walk out after the first racist diatribe. And maybe lost the alderman election.

Still, I'm going to no more judge Obama for going to that church than I will Hillary for staying with Bill after all the extramarital stuff.

Again, I have to point out how utterly asinine this seems to me. We've got a war going on that's costing us billions of dollars a month, and more in human costs, we've got an economic meltdown, we've got a place like New Orleans (which STILL is nowhere NEAR back to what it was) that needs rebuilding, ISPs that are behaving inappropriately, and other issues that affect people.

But what do people get stuck on? A non-issue like the specifics of what someone's pastor said.

It's ridiculous. That isn't politics or political discourse. It's gossip.

 

[Wavicle]

Isn't there a better attack against Obama than "the guy who leads the church he attends has an uncomfortable view of race relations"?

Come on. The guy who leads the church I attend has a politically incorrect view of homosexuality that I am uncomfortable with. If you demand that all the preachers at a Presidential Candidate's chosen congregation deliver only politically correct sermons you are in denial. JFK was a Roman Catholic, yet somehow he managed to lead without the Pope sitting in his cabinet.

Pathetic.

 

[corplinx]

... is the height of magical mind-reading. Sure he wasn't repulsed enough by the whacky rev to get out of Dodge, but it's quite a stretch to claim that he held on to this particular snake-charmer knowing that it was going to blow up in his face one day.

No it isn't. You chopped off the self-fulfilling prophecy that preceded it.

 

[Kaylee]

There was nothing riding on his choice, no political consequences to his decision if he was wrong.

Disagreed. IIRC, when we first went to war, it had political support, so Obama's stance was probably unpopular and he won the senate election despite that.

 

[WildCat]

Disagreed. IIRC, when we first went to war, it had political support, so Obama's stance was probably unpopular and he won the senate election despite that.

Not in his Illinois State Senate district it wasn't.

 

[Dr Adequate]

From http://video.aol.com/video-detail/ba...ight/763572789:


My emphasis in bold.

Finally someone provides a quote.

Now, if you look at the interview, here you will see that Obama's responding to a question about "God damn America". Obama replied by saying that he had never personally heard Wright use "such incendiary language". Do we have any reason to suppose that this isn't true?

 

[T.A.M.]

I absolutely think it is a good thing. Hero worship of individuals has brought humanity down to some of the lowest depths over the course of our history. We need never forget that our leaders are people, sometimes smarter, sometimes dumber than the rest of us, but people nonetheless.

Of course. There is a difference in vetting, and the character assassination on Obama that Hannity and others are carrying out though.

This is part of the problem and the very attitude I'm trying to combat. People like Obama run all the time (as has been said, he and Clinton are nearly indistinguishable on the issues) and the message he brings is "change," which, I hate to break it to you, is a buzzword used in EVERY election in which an incumbant is unpopular. People shouldn't lose their cynicism or, perhaps more importantly, their skepticism.

On the issues perhaps, but I was 22 when Bill won the white house, and I do not remember him evoking the crowds, or the movement that Obama has. I do not recall reading that Jimmy Carter did either. I know Kerry and Gore did not elicit this type of movement.

I realize "change" is a buzzword, we have politics in my neck of the woods as well. It is more than the "change" issue. It is a collection of all these things and more, as I have tried to explain.

It is his call for change, his stand on the issues, his communication ability, his charisma, his biracial heritage, and more...it is the sum total, not any individual piece...It is also about the right person at the right time.

I am glad you distingiuished between cynicism and skepticism, as the difference is important here. I agree everyone should be skeptical, but I think to go in assuming he is the same old politician, more of the same, more of what everyone dislikes (aka cynicism) is what people should lose, or at least tone down.

Which is what?

MORE OF THE SAME.

TAM

 

[Dr Adequate]

Here's an exercise in critical thinking for you. I provided a link to an aol video in which Obama says all the things you're denying in the first five minutes. Look around on your screen. You'll probably see an arrow somewhere that we call a "cursor". I want you to move your cursor over the blue, underlined words in previous post and click it. The rest takes care of itself. Isn't technology wonderful?

* sigh *

Last time you told me that some video backed you up, I wasted eight minutes of my life looking for statements that weren't actually there. In this case, the temptation to let you waste my time is rather easier to resist, since for some reason my browser won't play aol videos.

Now, please QUOTE some specific thing that Obama said that you consider to be a lie.

Thank you.

 

[Kaylee]

Not in his Illinois State Senate district it wasn't.

Fair enough. But per wiki he started running for the Senate (national vs. state) in 2003.

Was the entire state anti-war?

 

[WildCat]

Was the entire state anti-war?

Our other Senator is Dick Durbin, if that tells you anything.

 

[steverino]

* sigh *

Last time you told me that some video backed you up, I wasted eight minutes of my life looking for statements that weren't actually there.

Kinda' goes with the territory around these here parts.

 

[SDC]

You say this as if it is a good thing. We should be ashamed of ourselves that we as humans long for people to be "pummelled" to be "brought down", especially when the person in question's message is such a positive one.

Yes he was revered, put on a high pedestal by some. It has been a long time since the USA had anyone like Obama running, or the message he brings, and the way he brings it. He has come at a time when change is desperately sought after both by your countrymen, and the world. Some people have really bought into it, and made it their own cause...oh how bad of them to lose their cynicism, even for a few moments.

Well if this results in Obama not getting elected, then those who were a part of this story line's continuance will get what they deserve for a leader.

TAM

Actually, in my lifetime, a number of American presidents have presented themselves this way, successfully. (Because they won). I'd say Kennedy, Reagan, and Clinton. You may argue that you don't like their policies, or the policies of some of them, but I think it is clear that they have successfully presented themselves in the same way Obama is attempting now to present himself.

Whether that's good or bad is for later.

 

[Dr Adequate]

Wrong. The first interview Obama ever gave on this matter was on Olberman's Countdown where he not only said he wasn't in church that day but that he never heard anything like those comments in church or in his private talks with Wright. Here is the video to prove it: http://video.aol.com/video-detail/barack-obama-denies-jeremiah-wright/763572789

He said that he'd never heard Wright use "such inflammatory language", when asked about "God damn America".

He also said, in the Olberman interview, and I quote (a concept that you seem to find baffling) :

I did not hear such incendiary language myself, personally, either in conversations with him or when I was in the pew. He always preached the social gospel and was sometimes controversial in the same way that many people who'd speak out on social issues are controversial.

Got that? He says that he did not hear Wright using "such inflammatory language" as "God damn America". He says that he heard Wright being controversial. He said these things one after another, in the same paragraph. There is no conflict between them.

So, in order to know if he's changed his tune since the Olberman interview, we should have to know what corplinx means by:

There was a radio interview today where Obama basically admitted that he knew Wright was like this from private talks.

This, of course, would require us to know what Obama actually said on this fabled radio interview, which would save us the trouble of guessing what the spinmeister means by "basically admitted" and "like this", and then taking his word for it. Some sort of, oh, I don't know ... quotation would be nice.

Sheesh, it's like pulling teeth.

 

[corplinx]

Finally someone provides a quote.

Now, if you look at the interview, here you will see that Obama's responding to a question about "God damn America". Obama replied by saying that he had never personally heard Wright use "such incendiary language". Do we have any reason to suppose that this isn't true?

Perhaps because he implied this was the case in his speech on the matter (but came short of directly reversing what he had said)?

Not to mention in a radio interview in the past 5 days which I heard excepts of, he implied heavily that he heard this kind of language personally from Wright but admired Wright's community work. I'll dig up a link to the radio interview, but I would probably be wasting my time.
Edited to Add: This is 100 percent incorrect.

You have dug in so far on this issue that you are now in bunker mentality like Trisk outright ignoring any evidence that contradicts you.

 

[IchabodPlain]

Finally someone provides a quote.

No problem.

Now, if you look at the interview, here you will see that Obama's responding to a question about "God damn America". Obama replied by saying that he had never personally heard Wright use "such incendiary language". Do we have any reason to suppose that this isn't true?

You could take his quote in at least two ways. One is that 'such' refers specifically to "God damn America", or another way of reading it would elicit 'such' to mean statements similar in nature to "god damn America".

ASLKGAhfadgfsfhs. I promised myself I would steer clear of this debate. I've said too much